Planning the heating, ventilating and cooling (HVAC) requirements of a home is one of the most critical aspects of homebuilding. With the User Friendly Home, you'll see how good planning can go a long way!
The User Friendly Home
has tried to incorporate the Boy Scout principle into every aspect of the home's design and the HVAC system is no exception. We spoke with a number of our sponsors to find out more about the unique HVAC features and appliances of this home. HEATING AND COOLINGThe heating, ventilating and cooling (HVAC) system should work together as a whole to create the most comfortable and efficient home environment possible. Even top-of-the-line products will not perform to their potential if they are not installed properly. The HVAC features of this home were designed by Delta-T Consulting to offer the best in efficiency, comfort and overall home environment.
At the heart of the User Friendly home is a natural gas CompleteHeat system from Lennox. As its name suggests, the CompleteHeat system is a total heating package, which provides high-efficiency home and water heating in one unit.
Not only is the CompleteHeat incredibly efficient, offering a 90% combined annual efficiency rating (CAE), it's smart, too -- the same fuel energy used to heat your home's water also heats your indoor air. With Lennox' advanced electronics, CompleteHeat can deliver ample heat and hot water, even when the demand for hot water is high. The design of the unit is efficient: access panels offer easy access for hassle-free maintenance.
Honeywell
added the F25 high-efficiency air cleaner to the system to further improve air quality in the home. The air cleaner is a pleated media filter, which can be upgraded to an electronic air cleaner (this was not added, as some people are sensitive to ozone).According to Honeywell, the cost of installing the air filter at the same time the heating system is installed is approximately $500 to $600. The cost of adding the same filter later on? Nearly double that amount! Now that’s something to think about!
In many conventional homes, heat is delivered through rather large forced-air ducts, which can require massive drop areas for the ductwork. By contrast,
Bush Sales provided the User Friendly Home with the Hi-Velocity Soft-Aire System which uses small diameter tubing for heating and cooling with a two-inch duct system. Small diameter ducts allow maximum versatility and can be installed easily with minimal architectural changes.The Hi-Velocity Soft-Aire system uses increased static pressure to accomplish the same result as larger ducts. The Hi-Velocity Soft-Aire system offers superior heating and cooling and removes up to thirty percent more moisture from the air than conventional systems, resulting in improved home health and comfort.
Because the vents for the Hi-Velocity Soft-Aire System deliver high-pressure air, once the air leaves the outlet, it expands rapidly and creates a low-pressure zone, which eliminates the need to have vents directly above or below windows for circulation.
To add to this efficient delivery system, Honeywell used programmable thermostats to create three distinct "zones": the garage, the main floor and the upstairs plus individually controlled in-floor heating in the three bathrooms.
Zoning is essentially a way of putting comfort where you need it -- a way of maintaining different temperature levels in different areas of the home. As one Honeywell representative put it: "We all practice some form of zoning already -- when you walk into a house you don't turn all the lights on at once, just the ones you need first. The same goes for plumbing -- you don't need all the toilets in the house to flush together, just one." By that logic, why heat the entire house if you're only going to use part of it?
Zoning is a smart way to save energy and money, too. With a programmable thermostat, simply turning the temperature down five degrees for eight hours while you are away at work or asleep at night can save you 23% on space heating!
For extra warmth and comfort, you could use one of the Elite 35 direct-vent gas Fireplaces from Lennox. They are so User Friendly, they even feature remote thermostatic controls!
The zoning in the User Friendly Home can also be used to cool off certain areas of the home-- especially with the efficient, quiet and reliable Elite 11 Air Conditioner, also from Lennox.
Another smart heating feature of the User Friendly Demonstration Home is the use of radiant in-floor heating in the three bathrooms, thanks to
Vanguard Piping Systems. Radiant in-floor heating tubes warm the floor and make cold feet a thing of the past! Radiant heat provides greater comfort at a lower operating cost. Because radiant heat warms you directly, not the air, virtually no heat is wasted and you can enjoy up to 30% savings over conventional heating systems. Radiant heating systems can also become part of your customized zoning plan and can take on other functions by adding controls to heat your hot water, hot tub or melt the snow on your driveway. INDOOR COOKING AND CLEANING Efficiency has not been overlooked in the kitchen or the laundry room, either. Camco Inc. provided all the appliances for the User Friendly Demonstration Home and installed high-efficiency natural gas equipment wherever possible.Camco chose kitchen appliances from GE's Profile Performance Series, including a stainless steel fridge with ice and water dispenser, a built-in dishwasher with 100% water filtration and sani-wash cycle, a microwave oven with child lock-out feature, a stainless steel self-cleaning convection oven and a 36-inch, 18,000 BTU professional gas cooktop with electronic ignition.
In the laundry room, Camco has installed a front loading GE Spacemaker washer and the extra-large capacity GE Spacemaker natural gas dryer. Natural gas dryers offer fuel cost savings of up to 45% over electric dryers and less static cling!
THE GREAT OUTDOORSSo far, we've just looked at the main living areas of the home, but what about heating other areas such as a workshop in the garage or the outdoor patio area? To tackle these needs, Bush Sales installed a freestanding fan coil heating system in the garage, and Hydrowest Products installed a natural gas patio heater in the beautiful barbecue area. Traditional gas piping can make installing patio heaters cost prohibitive if they are placed in a far corner of a yard because of the length of pipe and the amount of welding required. JSA Sales installed Gas Tite flexible piping to connect the patio heater with the gas supply. Flexible piping is cost effective, easy to install, and reliable. The patio heater can take the edge off a chilly night and includes a remote on/off timer. The natural gas barbecue from Johnstone Barbecue & Appliances features a "quick-connect" hookup, meaning there are no heavy tanks to carry or fill. The "quick-connect" taps directly into the home’s gas supply.
OTHER USER FRIENDLY FEATURES
The User Friendly Demonstration Home is also prepared for an earthquake, should one occur in the Lower Mainland. Homeworks Inc. sponsored the safety products for the home.
An earthquake shut-off valve, which shuts off the gas supply in the event of a significant earthquake, has been installed on the gas meter. The house has also been bolted to its foundation for added security.
Homeworks Inc. also provided an emergency preparedness kit as well as three CO detectors for different areas of the home to warn homeowners of unsafe carbon monoxide levels in the home.
The User Friendly Demonstration Home is also ready to withstand the wilds of a Westcoast winter, thanks to Allied Windows. All the windows for the home achieve the highest PowerSmart performance ratings (CSA A440-M90), and feature rainscreen design (as part of Allied’s 7000 series). The rainscreen principle uses a pressure-equalized chamber to maintain a pressure differential at the glazing tape which is not exposed to the elements, thus reducing the potential for leakage. The primary seal is kept "high and dry to the inside" and water drains down and out. No leaks to worry about here.
Our home is also one of the very first in North America to carry a new system which makes power from non-essential services to be off loaded onto the local power grid at peak times for power usage. This exciting concept is a test project from Cutler-Hammer and BC Hydro. Be sure to check out the control panel in the workshop area of the User Friendly Home.
Suppliers of HVAC Systems & Products to the